She wore a circlet of flowers in her hair and a huge velvet cape that fastened at the neck and was open to reveal a lace blouse and a skirt with tiny gold mirrors stitched on it. Her bare legs and feet, crammed into rubber-soled sandals, were very white. Like the jars of duck fat you saw lined up when the French market came to Bath in the summer.

‘Good.’ She took a long draw on the cigarette. ‘Nice to see the police doing something worthwhile instead of busting the innocent.’

‘I’m DI Benedict.’ Zoë put her hand out. ‘Pleased to meet you.’

The woman put the cigarette into her mouth and shook the hand. She peered at Zoë through the smoke, getting the measure of her. After a moment or two she seemed satisfied. ‘Amy,’ she said. ‘And him? Who’s he?’

‘DI Ben Parris.’ Ben offered his hand.

Amy shook it, eyeing him suspiciously. Then she took the cigarette out of her mouth and motioned for them to sit down. ‘No tea – generator died on me two weeks ago, and you really don’t want to see me doing my thing with the Primus stove.’

‘That’s OK. We won’t be long.’ Zoë pulled out her pocketbook. After all these years, with all the technology available, the force still liked everything noted in handwriting. Even so, she usually backed it up by recording everything on her iPhone. Technically she shouldn’t, not without asking permission, but she did it anyway. She’d developed a technique – a quick pass of the hand over her pocket, knew the keys without looking. Beep-beep with her fingers and she was recording, pretending with the notepad. ‘Our constable said you had something you wanted to talk about.’

‘Yes,’ said Amy. Her eyes were very intense, spiralled with broken veins. ‘I saw the body. Lots of us did.’

‘That was unfortunate,’ Ben said. ‘We do our utmost to preserve scenes. Sometimes we don’t manage it.’